


Advent Calendar

by Aithilin



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Advent Calendar, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Established Relationship, Fluff, Holiday Traditions, M/M, Slice of Life, series of dreabbles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-05
Updated: 2020-01-05
Packaged: 2021-02-24 16:40:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 9,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21681085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aithilin/pseuds/Aithilin
Summary: Calendars full of little gifts were a tradition in Galahd, though Nyx had neglected it over the past few years.
Relationships: Noctis Lucis Caelum/Nyx Ulric
Comments: 56
Kudos: 50





	1. Day 1

Some things were universal across Eos.

Feasts and festivals based in the turning, changing seasons; fairy tales and legends that had carried over from one kingdom to the next, shared between years of treaties and truces and prosperous trade. The universal gift of chocolates was one, and socks another. Though there were small tweaks and tricks between the different countries to make those similar, universal traditions their own. 

And every year, Noctis was amazed by the small differences that set places like Galahd and Tenebrae apart from Lucis. 

“What is that?”

“A gift calendar.” The thing had appeared overnight in Nyx’s apartment. A long, durable rope with thirty-one numbered pouches lining it. Each pouch a different pattern or colour— set apart from its mates with tags and stripes or spots. The rope had been painted the same indigo as Nyx’s preferred banners— the ribbons and markings of his uniform reflected in the decorations and trailing twine now hanging over his bed. “Ma just sent it. Got one for you too.”

Nyx had pinned the thing across the niche where his bed had been shoved, in place of the old laundry line that had been abandoned when Noctis offered the use of his washer and dryer as an excuse to visit. The colourful little pouches with their colourful numbers and tags dipped in the middle, and Nyx was busy trying more strings to it to keep the thing straight.

“A gift calendar?”

“Yeah, had one since I was a kid.” Nyx offered a grin over his shoulder at Noctis as he secured the last support needed to ensure the whole thing didn’t come down on them in their sleep. “Guess Ma decided I’ve been ignoring my ‘good son’ duties and sent one. Two. One for you, like I said.”

The second one was in the royal colours of Lucis— the thick rope tar black though doused with sparkles of gold and silver. The pouches, like Nyx’s array of colours, were a mix of materials and patterns, with tags printed with the family crest tied around each seventh. He stretched it out to examine, the shine of the glitter catching in his hands as well as the dark pouches. On examination, he could see that there was something in each pouch— not too heavy, not too awkwardly shaped. Some pouches’ contents felt like stiff plastic, while others crinkled like paper.

“And a gift in each one, I’m guessing?”

“Yup,” Nyx hopped down from the makeshift step stool made from a never used foot rest that had come with his favourite chair and admired his handiwork. “One for each day.”

Noctis started to tug at the little pouch numbered with a golden five and stopped when Nyx caught his hands; “What?”

“Can’t just jump in, little king. You start at day one.”

“But we’re already at the fifth.”

“So? Even Libs would kill me if I started on the wrong day.”

With a roll of his eyes, Noctis shifted the rope until he was at the start of it. 

He wasn’t sure what he had expected. 

Wrapped around a little bag of candy fish was a note done in a delicate handwriting that reminded him of his father’s scrawl— of the letters archived deep in the Citadel that would be released decades after the King had passed, but that Noctis had read in his curious childhood. It was the same delicate, arching script of a noble woman, and Noctis was reminded of his mother’s own words imprinted in letters and notes and diaries. From the pictures of Nyx’s mother, he wouldn’t have expected the same sort of handwriting. 

But he supposed there were still things he was learning about Nyx. 

The note was short, and simple. Tied around the small sample bag of candy with an elastic rather that the twine he had expected. 

“What’s she say?”

“I’m sure Nyx can explain this to you.” Noctis read aloud, setting the note aside and looking at the candy fish with their colourful wrapping. He had seen them in Galahdian shops before, and overpriced in Lucian ones selling imported wared. “Does she mean the candy? Or the calendar?”

“Probably both.”


	2. Day 2

The calendar was easy enough to hang up in his apartment— pinned to the wall in a winding pattern to save the space. Noctis admired it in the brighter light of his sunny living room. He admired the shine of gilded threads and changing pattern of the fabrics. He found himself drawn to it for the rest of the day, running his hands over the variety of cloth and material stitched and woven together along the long strand of tar black rope. The two painted onto the second bag in the line glittered in the afternoon light streaming through his balcony windows. 

The first pouch had been sewn together in patches— soft and worn material that could have been cut from a shirt. This second was a single fold of stiff black dyed leather folded around and pulled closed with another, thin and supple strip of cut leather. The number was painted on with gold paint and sprinkled with a shining glitter that clung to his hands with each touch he passed over the whole creation. 

And there was a weight to it. Something hard and misshapen lodged in the pouch at an odd angle. 

“You can open it, you know,” Nyx said, poking through the kitchen as he watched Noctis trying to guess what was wrapped up in the leather pouch. “You have a couple of days to catch up on.”

Noctis smiled at the reminder. He had already counted down the days in his mind; a Lucian calendar had confirmed that the little pouches with tags and insignia had been set apart as markers for his own holidays. Though Nyx’s own collection of gifts had been marked differently. 

“I thought you said it was bad luck to open more than one a day?”

“Only if you plan to open all of them in a single night, little star.” Nyx settled on a tea that was tucked away in the back of Noctis’ cupboard. Water was set to boil in the little kettle and Nyx smiled from across the counter as he settled in to wait. “Go for it.”

The enthusiastic opening of little gifts back in Nyx’s apartment had been justified then. Shipping and delays and difference in time zones justified the wild abandon of anticipation as Nyx left the empty array of pouches dangling from their strings back in his apartment, already eyeing up the days yet to come. They had left the collection of gifts— the sweets and little tokens— of the the first few days of the month out on the kitchen counter as they left. As they carried the box Nyx had dutifully collected from the mail with them, stuffed again with Noctis’ own gift once it was agreed that they would set the calendar up in his apartment. 

And now, feeling out the little hidden treasure wrapped up in the dark dyed leather, Noctis felt the same childish curiosity as he had when he was young. When there was a mountain of presents clearly gifted from companies and stores and people hoping to use his visibility. And when there was a single little gift in his father’s hands, waiting for his attention. 

He opened the pouch. 

Curved and barbed hooks were topped with small pieces of cork, taped and wrapped in plastic. Noctis knew the style of protection— homemade lures didn’t come in packages and parcels already approved for sale by safety councils. 

What he had thought was a hard, unyielding plastic was a light polished wood. Weighted along one side to let it bob and weave through the waters as he reeled it in. He knew the style, he had the Lucian equivalents. They were easy, popular lures he had bought by the dozen; a draw for the early morning fish who fed in the reeds and shade close to the surface where he could see the wet glisten of their scales beneath the surface. 

Noctis smiled as he felt the weight of the lure, examined the intricate patterns carved along the polished wood surface. “You’ve been telling her about me.”

“Of course I was.”


	3. Day 3

Ignis had helped him decorate for the season before. When the weather had started to change, the city had clamoured for the details of the royal decorations. The papers and news stories had made a show of the reveal within the public halls of the Citadel— the wreaths fashioned from the farmers of Cleigne and the ranchers of Duscae, driftwood decorations gifted by Galdin and given a flair by the bones and shells picked up from the sandy beach. Elements from across the kingdom had been represented in the public decorations that anyone was welcome to see; lights and decorated trees, trinkets and seasonal offerings carved from bone and antlers. They lined selected portions of the hallways opened to the public within the Citadel, perfumed little pouches of souvenirs printed with the year available at reception for the keen tourist eager to have a taste of the Citadel’s grandeur. 

But the city wanted the private decorations first and foremost. 

They wanted to see the festive tree— often sculpted and fashioned by the best the artistic talents if the kingdom had to offer— set out in the royal study, with its array of lights streaming from it like a curtain. Noctis remembered the fuss that had been made when he was young, and a real tree from a Cleigne orchard was brought— still living— to the study, and safely transplanted to the garden later. He remembered the posed pictures with the first of the gifts sent by companies, the bags overflowing with letters and well wishes for the year from the Crown City citizens that had dwarfed him at his father’s side. He remembered dressing up and Ignis trying to distract him from the steady march of strangers that wandered through the private residences to gawk and take pictures for newspapers and magazines.

And every year they wanted to see what he had decided to do for his decorations. How small or big he wanted to go. 

Ignis had supplied the tree this year. It was a tiny thing, barely a foot tall made of bundled rosemary and thyme and a few sprigs of lavender. It had spent days on his kitchen counter, until Prompto came over and said he could make a bit of cash off pictures of it for a paper that had been bugging him. 

Noctis moved it to beneath the calendar from Nyx’s mother. A chair stolen from the dining table to hold it. They bundled a few oranges around its base to hide the simple pot it was in and Noctis added the bag of sweets pulled from the third pouch of the calendar. Some tinsel was tossed along the back of the chair and Prompto set a bow on a Cup Noodles to tuck into the background to tease Gladio with later. The calendar was prominent in the shot— snaking up in the afternoon light as the only real decoration in the mix. 

“These are good,” Prompto said once he had most of the shots he wanted. Once he had successfully pretended the holiday cheer was firmly rooted in his friend’s apartment so early in the season. 

Later they would have actual decorations, lights and carvings and whatever centrepiece had actually caught someone’s eye. But for now, for a short time to get Prompto some extra money, the ruse was worth it. 

“Aren’t they?” Noctis smiled, stealing the bag from the makeshift stage. 

The chocolates were tiny, hand rolled and spiced. Noctis held one up to the light to see if there was any indication that his boyfriend’s mother hadn’t spent hours slaving over each little ball. Nyx had assured him that it was a traditional treat— that there were bowls filled with them back in Galahd, and more to come if they just asked. Nyx had assured him that there was no ‘slaving’ over anything in his mother’s kitchen, unless they counted the recruitment of himself and Selena when they were younger. 

They had been in a little plastic snack bag inside the numbered pouch. And Nyx had sulked when he realized that any in his own calendar were still to come. 

They were smooth chocolates, and Noctis imagined how he had seen Ignis temper and mix chocolates for his own experiments and sweets. He wondered how they were made, and he could see Prompto thinking the same thing. 

“Think Iggy can recreate them?” Prompto asked, stealing one last sample before Noctis sealed off the bag and set them aside. 

Nyx huffed and took the bag from them; “No. He can’t.”


	4. Day 4

No one knows how the cookies actually survived the trip brought the mail. There had been barely a crumble in the golden exterior, wrapped carefully as they were between folds of tissue paper and tied together with the same sort of twine that had been holding other gifts together. They were shaped like golden, crisp shells; delicate and thin on one end, thick and spongey on the other. Lines from whatever sheet they were baked in scored what Noctis had decided was the top of the cookie. The underside smooth though pocked with bubbles. 

“It seems more like a cake,” Ignis mused. 

Noctis was still catching up on the gifts. The gap widening as he took his time to savour each trinket an treat that was revealed with each new day. Nyx had stayed the night, and watched Ignis examine the treat with no small amount of curiosity. A fresh coffee was cradled in his hands, a small smile on his lips as he watched the curious examination of the treats he knew well. He wanted to ruin the surprise— the secret use of the sweet and spongey treat— as Noctis tore a piece of from the delicate outer edge to taste. 

He could have laughed at the look shared between Noctis and Ignis, both surprised by the sweet cake taste.

“You said it was a cookie, Nyx.”

“It is,” Nyx lifted his coffee to hide his smile. 

“I have doubts about that definition,” Ignis muttered, tearing another sampling from the confection they had been examining. None of the four baked goods had wilted under their scrutiny yet, but Nyx was certain that Ignis would dissect the thing if he could. “It requires a special baking sheet, I suppose?”

“Yes,” Nyx agreed. 

“And there is a sweeter glaze,” Ignis observed as he lifted an intact specimen to consider. 

“Yes.” Nyx agreed again, and smiled at the analysis of a treat he had been tasting every holiday for as long as he could remember. 

“Will you be providing any detail at all, Ulric?”

“No.”

Noctis, meanwhile tore a larger piece from the already abused sampling. “I like it.”

There had been a note among the tissue wrapping that Nyx had spied first and discreetly slipped close. He protected the note in part to keep it from being bundled away with the tissue and twine when it was discarded. But mostly to keep Ignis’ eyes away from the clearly noted recipe that took up most of it. 

He knew where to get the right baking sheet in the city— nearly any Galahdian shop would carry it. He knew the recipe by heart— years spent at his mother’s side, stirring the batter and glazing the shells. He remembered spending the long winter evenings in the heat of his mother’s kitchen, sneaking peeks at the rising cookies to judge just how golden they had grown in the oven in between sinks full of dishes that needed to be cleaned. He remembered every sweets and tart scent that could permeate a kitchen during the holidays. 

Nyx set down his coffee with the same sly smile and selected one of the untouched cookies to quickly dip in the steaming drink. He watched the air of revelation dawn in Ignis’ eyes, amazed at the seeming use he hadn’t even considered. 

Noctis smiled and imitated the trick; dipping the rest of the assaulted sweet in Nyx’s mug and shaking off the excess that hadn’t immediately been absorbed into the sponge of the confection. “I think this might be a way I could actually like coffee.”

“It’s even better with a hot chocolate.”


	5. Day 5

He should have guessed what the fifth pouch was from just the familiar shape. It was the same round style of his sinking lures— as the heavy arihman lure he had taken a shine to lately— that he could feel through the soft silver striped material of the pouch. He could hold the pouch from the string enough to feel the weight along one side, and he smiled as he turned the pouch inside out to get the lure freed from the material. Like the other, it was wrapped, but he could see the familiar points of ears poking through all the same. Still carved rather than cast in plastic, Noctis admired the delicate details carved along the familiar shape. 

“So, how much did you actually tell your mother about me?”

Nyx smirked, still teasing Ignis with the hidden recipe for the cookies unwrapped from the previous day’s pouch. “Ma knows everything, little star. I wouldn’t question it.”

Noctis glanced to where Ignis was still focused on the cookie shaped like a shell. His pen moved across the pages of his notebook in a rush as Nyx tapped the crisply folded note against his mug. 

“I can’t risk using these lures, hero. What if the line breaks?”

“We can get you more, you know.”

The wrapping was pulled away from the carved wood. The delicate details cut into the polished wood, caught the morning light of the apartment, and Noctis held it up for examination. The wood was grey naturally rather than painted, like the the old toy that still rested at his bedside. The loop cut for the line was a soft cherry, cheerful red— the only painted detail that Noctis could see on the whole thing. He thought of the fishing that he did with a similar lure, the Altissean Carbuncle in his tackle not nearly as detailed or intricate, but well used. 

“I’ll find a display box,” Ignis offered, eyes not moving from his notebook as he tore another sample from one of the cookies— determined to work out the ratio of ingredients from taste alone. “So long as Ulric gives up that damned recipe.”

Noctis grinned at the threat buried in that frustrated statement. There had been years when Ignis was determined to perfect a recipe— the delicate pastries of Tenebrae, the curries of Cavaugh that Noctis had taken a shine to— where he could be lost to the Citadel kitchens for hours. There had been experiments and attempts for every newly tasted dish— most twists and tweaks abandoned to the notebook Ignis kept of his failed successes (as everything was still edible, just not to Ignis’ exacting standards). And Noctis assumed these treats would be the same— the bland, soft sponge that Noctis found he craved more of even though he had just finished one. 

“Nyx—”

“Fine, fine. Ma will love that you want it.”

Noctis smiled at the successful negotiation that led to his diplomatic victory in the matter, and set the wooden lure aside with the other. He was still behind on opening these pouches, and the curl and curve of the six that had been sewn into the next day gleamed like a temptation.


	6. Day 5

“That’s the little note Ma leaves for the end of a week,” Nyx explained as he caught sight of Noctis examining the little tag. Its ribbon had been looped into the twine keeping the pouch shut and secure on its rope, the silver there to offset the abundance of black and gold. It was stamped— and it had to have been a stamp, because Noctis didn’t think it was humanly possible to trace the Seal of Insomnia to perfectly— in silver ink that shone under the right light, but faded back into the paper when left alone. “She counts it at the Friday.”

“And the others?” Noctis indicated the little tags scattered along the dates he knew to follow Lucian holidays— each marked with a different silver design. 

Nyx confirmed his understanding of them with a small smile; “Your holidays.”

Ignis had already left with the treasured new recipe in his hand; the original note set aside on the kitchen counter for his return, and his copy scribbled down in delight in his notebook. He had rummaged through the cupboards as he left, muttering to himself before finally thinking to tell Noctis what he was doing. There was no immediate need to master a new confection, but there was a Citadel event in a week. And Ignis was not one to let his experiments linger untouched. 

He had rushed from the apartment, and Noctis had returned his attention to the gap of days in the calendar. 

This one felt different. 

He traced the shape first before giving in on his guesses and simply turning the pouch inside out. A bundle of tissue fell into his hand, just like the other days. 

“A jar?”

It was a small jar— stopped up with a little cork glued into place at its mouth. He remembered old stories of letters sent out to sea in glass jars. Of wishes and pleas carried across the waves from coast to cove sealed away just the same. But this one had a letter wrapped around the jar instead— to obscure the prize inside. 

Inside— hidden away by a delicate script not unlike Nyx’s own but different from the other little notes— was a little paper fish. It was an intricately folded piece of sturdy paper, blue with little folds to mimic scales. It had been puffed out and slid into the jar before the cork seal was glued into place. Lines were painted on the glass of the jar like waves in a soft green and blue and teal between them. And Noctis smiled at the strange whimsy of the thing. 

“That would be Selena,” Nyx offered, grinning as he slipped the note from Noctis’ hand to read. “Definitely Selena.”

Noctis could only imagine the woman he had seen in Nyx’s pictures sitting at a table making the perfect folds. The same look of concentration that Nyx had as she painted the lines without spilling a drop of paint. He could picture the woman— whom he had never met, but heard years’ worth of stories from Nyx— writing out the note as an after though. 

_Hello, royal little brother. Nyx said you liked fishing._


	7. Day 7

Noctis learnt that Selena painted. Nyx had told him some time ago, when they had been talking about their families— about the mundane little things like his dad’s outright helplessness against bottles with a twist cap (though Noctis had sorted out years ago that the feigned lack of dexterity to open the bottles was more just to get a reaction from Clarus)and Mrs. Ulric’s stubborn pride in her own kitchen. When they had been talking about the wilds in Galahd, which had seemed so far away and alien at the time; though Nyx had assured him that Lucis was far more unsettled and wild— the unexplored corners of Galahd could fit into one of Lucis’ dark and untamed forests. 

“That’s the house,” Nyx said, Noctis cushioned against his chest in the fading light of the afternoon. The long stretch of the winter night threatened by the patter of ice against the balcony and window behind them. 

Noctis preferred to focus on the overgrown little home in his hands— a detailed little painting that could likely fit in his pocket. It had certainly fit in the pouch of the calendar. 

The note this time had been a map, with the Ulric homestead marked off on one side with an ‘X’ in Selena’s precise script. And sketches overtaking the blank side. There were blooms and blossoms among the outline of the house. There were birds and feathers already lost to the smudges of ink on the paper, tiny details that could never fit in the painting. But Noctis smiled more at those little insights into Selena’s process. The little flowers that caught her eye, which Nyx could name off where she would have sat and sketched from. The front porch marked off by the pillars in the painting, obscured by a green and flowering bush, the garden around the back not shown in the painting, the window in the kitchen that looked over the forest border of their little spit of land. 

“It’s not what I pictured,” Noctis admitted, searching the little painting for the details he had lost. For the little details worked in with tiny strokes of a brush. With her eye and steady hand, Noctis wondered if Selena would have been a Glaive too, had the offer been made. 

“And what did you picture?”

“I dunno, something bigger?”

“It’s not exactly small in real life, little king. Four bedrooms, though I’m pretty sure Ma turned mine into a den. Or Selena uses it as a studio now.”

“I mean,” Noctis frowned as he searched for the words. The little home in the painting looked loved— green and bright, caught in the throes of an eternal, early summer on the island; “isn’t your family sort of important? Everyone knows the Ulrics type of thing?”

“We’re more troublemakers than pillars of the community.”

“I can’t imagine.”

“Shush,” Nyx unfolded the map again, and traced a line that must have been a road; “Libs’ family is the rich one. We’ve been friends for generations and I’m pretty sure our land came from them. Some big deed or something.”

“So he’s the important one.”

“Don’t tell him that. It will actually go to his head.”

“Did the Ulric cause the trouble? Or get out of it?”

“What?”

“To get the land.”

“Oh, both, I think. Dad used to say the Ostiums had to keep an eye on us.”

Noctis smiled and shifted, taking the little map with its doodles and wrapping it around the little painting. “I should send her pictures of Insomnia.”

“Selena would love that. I sent her stuff from all the tourist traps.”

“So something from inside the Citadel? The stuff no one ever sees.”


	8. Day 8

Meetings were infinitely better with snacks. 

Ignis had scowled when Noctis first started forming that habit. When snacks were tucked away into pockets before the suggestion that these meetings include more than just glasses of water was taken seriously. But he had always slipped a cookie, a treat, a small morsel left over from the lunch they had attended before. The Council had already accepted that there was no work to be done if Noctis was already bored with the politics, and even less if he was hungry on top of that. The implementation of the mid-session break, when small offerings of sandwiches and drinks were presented, had been a godsend in the long hours of debate and asinine prattle. 

When the meetings dragged on for hours, Noctis liked to have something better than just the small sandwiches and scones served to the officials. 

This time, when he found that he couldn’t escape the duties of his station, he had selected a mix of the treats gifted through his Galahdian calendar. 

“Your Highness, surely you agree—”

Noctis didn’t agree. Not with anything that was immediately set before him and his father. Not with any attempt like that to turn their opinions against each other— to divide them. 

He slipped a Galadhian chocolate into his mouth and stared down the presumptuous Council member trying to drag him into the argument. 

The Council member tried another tactic; “The state of the barracks is not a matter we should be focusing on. Not when there are other more stately affairs at hand.”

“Such as?” Clarus asked, ignoring the way Regis picked through Noctis’ little stash of treats. “I was under the impression this meeting was to discuss the state of the Crownsguard and Kingsglaive.”

“The funding could be put to better use else-”

“Where, exactly, Councillor?” Noctis selected another small chocolate from the collection. The spice of the aftertaste— cardamom and cinnamon, Ignis had stated to Nyx’s chagrin— offered enough of a bite to keep him focused on the task at hand. “The public libraries and schools all have generous support, including regular bolsters from Crown gifts. Hospitals across the city are still receiving their requested budgets in each district. The only areas that are lacking are the individual community requests.”

“Which are the responsibility of the Council member elected by the district,” Regis offered in support, selecting a chocolate from the pile. He muttered to his son as the debate seemed to lull; “These are good.”

“Nyx’s mother.”

“Ah, of course.” Before the Council could start up the debate further, Regis offered a smile; “I suppose that settles it then.”

“Majesty-”

“The Guard and Glaives have served faithfully for years, that trust will not be broken with me. If the budget for the year had been used,” the King turned to Clarus for confirmation; “then we can gift some necessities and revisit the budget in the new year.”

“During election season,” Noctis offered, as the Council paled at the suggestion. Several districts, he knew, would have a disproportionate amount of citizens in the ranks. “And my charity budget isn’t gone yet, I’ll gift it to the Glaives. Not like I need a winter ball or anything, Drautos could use it more.”

The Council member who had opposed the idea sulked in his seat, and Noctis knew that there would be trouble later from the man and his own district. They were the nobility, the wealthy, those who attended whatever balls the Crown held as a gesture of goodwill to the old families in the kingdom. 

Noctis preferred the Glaives. 

Clarus smiled at the victory as the Council left the conference room. As the King turned his attention to the treats on offer and Ignis stepped forward with his notes. “Good job, Highness.”

“Thanks, chocolate?”

“Mrs. Ulric’s?”

“Why do you both know what her cooking is like?”

Regis helped himself again; “My dear boy, she was among the first of the Glaives. Nyx is a new generation.”


	9. Day 9

The baby pictures were a surprise on the ninth day. It ha been a day marked by holidays in Lucis— festivities meant to spark nostalgia and reflection on the seasons that had passed. Though the New Year was technically heralded by the golden autumn of the kingdom, there was something about the muffled silence of the winter that seemed to encourage the quiet and contemplative thoughts of a rebirth to come. 

The world had woken to a fresh coating of snow. 

Or at least Noctis had. He was sure that the weather reports around the city weren’t exaggerating the far reaching extent of the flurries that had moved over the Wall in the night. Noctis had opened the pouch absentmindedly, eyes on the white skies beyond his balcony as he overturned the little pouch with its unusual tags. The folded papers had felt odd in his hands; they were stiff and thicker, and he almost expected another page of doodles from Selena. 

Instead, the page unfolded to a matte photo printed on a sturdy stock. Creased now, Noctis still smiled as he recognized the arctic blue of the child’s eyes looking back at him. The attached note was simple;

_Something to reflect on, at:_

The address was to a popular document sharing site and Noctis was frankly surprised it was useful beyond the vast networks of Lucis. 

“What the hell is that?”

Nyx had only glanced at the computer as he passed on his way for coffee. He doubled back as familiar pictures filled the screen, as Noctis seemed happy to cycle through the old memories Nyx had thought were long since lost. Or repressed, he was starting to wonder. Pictures he had thought were safely back in Galahd— out of sight of the curious eyes of his lover. He knew some were on proud display in his mother’s home— such as the ridiculous image currently on the screen— and others tucked away in boxes and albums stored in an attic or basement. 

Which is exactly where he wished the picture Noctis had stopped on was still safely stored away. Somewhere dark and sheltered and lost to the ravages of time. 

It was him, chubby cheeked and beaming a toothless grin at the camera, holding tiny fist fulls of mud and grass and worms. Something snapped decades ago when he was toddling around his mother’s garden. 

“I think it’s adorable,” Noctis grinned as he switched to the next picture in the show, and Nyx wanted to bury himself back in bed. 

“Where did you even get those? No, no, don’t answer.” He doubled down on the mission for coffee, refusing to acknowledge the new image from his childhood. Refusing to remember the shy little smile and the awkward way he was holding his new baby sister, how proud he felt when his mother placed that squirming precious bundle in his arms. “Ma’s gift today?”

“How were you so cute, hero?”

“I’m still cute.”

“Not like this.”

“Don’t you have better things to do?”

“Announcements and speeches. I’d rather keep going through these pictures.”


	10. Day 10

There was an elegance to the lights in the Citadel each year. They glittered and gleamed in the long hours of a dark winter. Against the cold sky and the shimmering Wall overhead the city lights seemed to break the night and the blanket of snow. 

“Pretty, you know,” Nyx muttered, bundled against the cold of the open air on the balcony. The city glittered like a million stars; and they stood amid the sky full of the shining, broken and artificial stars. He tucked his hands into his pocket as he watched the ceremonies start— the flickering of lights from the Citadel and its plaza until the surrounding bocks were dimmed. 

Until a proper night had fallen across the nearest few blocks. 

Until a circle of dark had been cut into the city’s glow. The lights from the apartment clicked off, leaving Nyx standing more or less in a darkness that churned his stomach. 

Noctis stepped in behind him, an arm settled around his waist as he wormed his way beneath one of Nyx’s arms. Nyx balanced the loss of access to his own pocket by slipping his hand into Noctis’. 

“In an industrial sort of way, I guess.” 

Noctis held up the day’s gift from the calendar— another of Selena’s pocket sized paintings. The little garden a blue and green night scene Nyx remembered well; where tiny swirls and streaks of golden light left by fireflies mimicked the more precise patterns of the white stars above the muted hues of the flowers. Held up to eye level, the little painting seemed to replace the dimmed city centre. 

Until the lights started to blink back on. 

They started at the top of the Citadel— the colours of the season filling the windows in patterns. Some were dark in a way only heavy black curtains could manage. 

“Not quite the same,” Nyx smiled against the cold as the music reached them— the light show, the images of historic events projected against the open space of the plaza beneath the towers. The audience on the ground watched the show from a different angle— only seeing the swirls and moving lights, lined along the bridge to the grand entrance of the palace to watched the projections in snippets and movements too big to comprehend at how close they were. Nyx thought it was fitting. 

For those like him and Noctis, the big picture was far more obvious. 

The images played against the sunken plaza stone; grand battles and the ascension of Kings, the Lucii among them through the ages. Appreciation wafted upward on the breezes with the music. The audience on the bridge matched by others crowded along balconies as they were, leaning over the railings as the Citadel glowed beneath the annual history lesson. The annual reflection of the history that had built the kingdom. 

Noctis held the little painting up again. 

“I think I prefer the garden.”

“I kind of like knowing this history.”

“Why? It’s nothing you don’t already know. And it’s barely even real.”

“But it resulted in you, so I kind of like it.”

“That’s the worst sweet talk you’ve come up with.”

The show caught up to modern history, where the allusion to a war was dulled beneath the peace of the Wall, and the comfort of Fatherly Regis ascending to his throne.


	11. Day 11

“Potpourri?”

The little pouch with the cheerful double line of the eleven blazoned on in golden paint had contained another small pouch. This second one was gauze and tied with ribbon, still wrapped in a tissue paper that now smelled of lavender and cinnamon and the strange scent of other dried herbs. Noctis had sniffed it before reading the little note, and found that the scent changed as he held it— as he pressed one area over another, or focused in one edge of the little gauze bag over the other. The scent escaped at first in small doses— a whiff, a breeze, a subtle little poof of sweetness and spice.

Until he pressed it. 

The more he handled it, the stronger the scents became. They mixed and moved until he could swear the corner of the apartment was drifting between Lucis and Galahd. 

“Ma sent me two of those.” Nyx smiled and took the note to examine it, memories of his mother’s cooking and gardens running through his head. 

The note was the recipe— the mixture of dried herbs and collection of scented pieces— rinds from oranges, dried lemons, cloves contained in a tiny aerated jar so they don’t overwhelm. Sticks of cinnamon and dried vanilla just barely broken to let the air get to it, tumbled around with fragile sprigs of lavender. And something beneath it all, with each press and shuffle of the concoction that drew the mixture forward, that was unique to Galahd. 

Unique to the little house so far away, with its sweet garden and starry sky. To the kitchen that produced chocolates and cakes and all manner of temptations to Noctis’ palate. That had produced Nyx in some form or another, who never failed to delight Noctis just as much as any of the small gifts.

Noctis fetched a small bowl from the kitchen and emptied the collection into it. No matter where he set it through the quiet apartment, the air was perfumed in hints and tastes. 

“It’s her kitchen blend,” Nyx suggested, still looking over the little note with a sappy smile as he searched the writing for what little flavour wasn’t listed in the recipe. 

Noctis set it on the kitchen counter and took a deep breath. He knew that the collection would tease Ignis. The seeming mix of unrelated, unseasonal fragrances carried through the sterile kitchen. The warmth that was left in its wake trailed after Noctis as he moved to rejoin Nyx on the couch. The ghost of the potpourri dissipating but not lost to the open room the further he went. 

“So her kitchen smells like that?”

“Sometimes. I think I know what tomorrow’s gift will be.”


	12. Day 12

Noctis couldn’t stop staring at the little things— at the folded paper with their perfect creases and expertly tucked edges. He lifted the little jar that had rattled around in the twelfth pouch, not cushioned by tissue but wrapped with a loosely bound note he was getting used to. 

“How does she make them?”

“No idea, little star.”

The tiny folds of paper rattled against the glass of the jar, colourful paper stars sealed into their little container with a cork glued into place. Noctis could tell that there was something written on each of the stars; a letter here, a curl of a tiny script word on another, little doodles on another— crowns, cats, more stars to pattern the little wonders. He had known others who did the same— who could fold the delicate little stars from scraps of squared papers with neat edges. 

“What’s written on them?”

“Wishes, usually,” Nyx rested behind Noctis on the couch, fingers combing through the Prince’s hair as he watched the tiny stars rattling around the jar as Noctis tried to catch the meaning behind the scribbles here and there. “She’s always made them.”

“Can you make them?”

“I don’t need to.”

“I know what you’re setting up.”

“Do you?”

“Of course I do,” Noctis smiled, leaning into the touch as he turned the little jar in his hands. Once side was painted a midnight blue, with a shining crescent moon lined in delicate curls. It would have taken a steady hand to get the paint even, to get the curl of the moon so perfect. To fold the collection of little stars barely dented by the shaking and rattle and bumping between the glass and paper. 

“Come on then.”

“No.”

“Fine, I can do it myself,” Nyx pressed a kiss to his forehead. He smiled softly and kept his hands moving in gentle strokes and soft twists of loose strands. “I don’t need to make these little paper stars because I have my own little star right here.”

“You’re such a dork.”

“But a smooth dork.”

“That was terrible.”

“Terribly good.”

“Shut up.”

“Make me.”


	13. Day 13

Noctis has seen the pattern before. Nyx had the floral, flowery carvings in the hilt of his kukri— cut into the bone and wood of the traditional weapons. He had seen the idle work of Nyx’s own hands— the petals and twists of stems, the delicate curves that had started as rough gouges in the woods he handled. In bones and antlers picked up from hunters travelling through the Crown City. He had watched as Nyx worked, a small knife tracing idle patterns— the man’s eyes on the news or a show, or Noctis as he worked. 

It had only ever been something to keep his hands busy. 

It had been something strange and distant and skilled beyond Noctis’ own comprehension. Some tradition taken from Galahd and set apart in Lucis for its uniqueness, it’s rustic nature and strange lack of manufacturing. 

Nyx had always laughed at the way he marvelled at the artwork. 

Because it was art. 

Whether it was an idle figure coming to life beneath Nyx’s skilled— if distracted— hands, or the intricate details found on his weapons, or embossed into his armour. Or cut into beads in infuriatingly tiny details. 

Or the patterns and designs cut and burned into the wooden ornaments he had pulled from the thirteenth pouch of the little gifting calendar. 

Wooden disks had been suspended on ribbons— violet, lilac, indigo, and black— one cut to an outline of a snowflake, and another shaped and sanded to the silhouette of Carbuncle. Noctis tried to hold them all up at once to examine the details, but had found them blurring together as the four of them moved in his hands. He set them down on the coffee table instead and smiled as the light caught the details not exaggerated by paint or charring.

“This is definitely Selena,” Nyx said, the skewer he had picked up from his favourite pub still dripping sauce as he examined the ornaments. He had indicated one left as a disk, painted flowers framing the delicate crescent moon burned into the pale wood— the intertwining patterns of vines and stars and Galahdian enhancements drawing attention away from the carved arrows notched into the pattern as if the moon was a bent bow. “She’s done the same thing since we were kids. Pretty sure she got it tattooed too.”

“It’s really nice.”

“You’re going to be great for my sister’s ego.”

“I’m already good for yours.”

“It’s much appreciated.”

The other disk had its carved lines accented by paint rather than blackened by fire. A bundle of flowers with spears for the stems— he could see lavender and thyme, rosemary and flat basil leaves among the bundle, all painted with quick and smooth strokes of a narrow brush. Each stem came to a pointed tip, with a lavender ribbon to match the real ribbon painted around them until the line flowed continuously in knots and curls and waves.

“Your mother,” it was an instant recognition, though Noctis felt that he had known very little of what must be a formidable woman. 

Nyx nodded, mouth full of food and hand cupped beneath to catch the sauce. 

His ornament was the snowflake— the mountain sigil rather than any affinity to the sea or forests, from Noctis’ understanding. He had heard stories of Nyx’s youthful adventures among steep cliffs and wide chasms, chasing adrenaline through Galahd Canyon in the mountain recesses and flaunting taboo in the ancient ruins that lined the chasm like bones. He smiled at the pattern burned into the shape; the arch of the familiar kukri crossed in the centre— the pointed tips as ears and the arch outlining eyes of a great cat, the wisps of whiskers nearly invisible in the delicate working of the wood. Most of the pattern seemed to vanish under direct light, the full force of the image only scene when the shadows cast by the carved grooves were turned. When lifted on its indigo ribbon, the image appeared and disappeared with each movement. 

“Yours is weird, hero.”

“I’m weird, little star.”

But Nyx took the ornament from Noctis and offered a skewer in its place. 

Noctis smiled and started on the offering, eyes drawn to the last ornament. Carbuncle hadn’t been painted, but the patterns had been burned into the shape— the intricate impression of fur, the solid lines of flowers for his little ruby. And the crisp blackened shape of a Lucian crown a delicate arch along Carbuncle’s long ear, following the natural shape and grain of the woods. He smiled around the spiced meat of his lunch, the familiar warmth of Nyx’s thigh against his own as his lover leaned in for a better look. 

“I think I like that idea better than the Bahamut horn one.”

“Me too.”

It took a moment to realize that the crown hadn’t been blacked like other patterns; the dark of the coffee table was shining through. Noctis held it up by the black ribbon for a better look. The light from the window was shining through the thin lines of the crown— what he thought had been carved or gouged into the surface actually cut all the way through and smoothed flat. 

“Maybe I should redesign my crown.”


	14. Day 14

The fourteenth gifts hadn’t fared as well as the others. Noctis could tell the moment he felt the tied off little pouch in his hand the rough edges of something broken answered him. He held the pouch for a moment, feeling the misshapen and shattered gift within, his stomach churning at the thought that it may be his fault. That he had been careless in bringing the calendar home, or handing it up. That he had been rough with it before knowing the extent of the gift; the other delicate treasures and treats seeming to have survived through sheer luck. 

He glanced to the little gifts already received, tucked away where they could be admired. Ignis’ careful, analytical scrawl held in place on the fridge door— stolen recipes overwritten by Nyx’s less precise scribbles and notes. Tiny pieces of art and life in Galahd, tucked around his apartment like trophies, catching the winter light and reminding him to be careful now. 

He was just glad that Nyx wasn’t there to see the broken treasure no doubt wrapped in folds of tissues and a note.

The pouch opened easily, like the thirteen before it, and Noctis withdrew the note first. 

_I would be amazed if this made it to Lucis in one piece._

The note was in the now familiar and precise scrawl. The delicate cursive that still reminded him of old letters and diaries stashed away in the depths of the Citadel written in another woman’s hand. Another woman who he felt the faintest pang of guilt for not remembering. 

Crumbs clung to the paper of the little note, and relief swept over him. 

On a second examination, the smell of ginger was unmissable. The crisp, spicy draw of the familiar scent had him overturning the pouch into his hand. 

The cookies had snapped multiple times. The jagged edges he had felt in his examination the shards of the baked treats. They had crinkled and cracked somewhere along the way, snapping with a satisfying noise and resistance as Noctis replicated the break in his hands. The cookie shard duplicated, and he tested the smaller piece. 

His experience with ginger snaps were the stale, bulk manufacture of Lucian industry. He had watched Ignis attempt them, but the consistency hadn’t been the same. It hadn’t broken with the snap of its name, it hadn’t burned his mouth with fresh ginger chased by sugary sweetness. They hadn’t been as thin as the shards in his hand, broken by travel into smaller morsels. 

Noctis smiled and tasted another small shard, wondering the mix of treats that still waited.


	15. Final Gift

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This had to be condensed due to various reasons.

Noctis had fallen behind in the new tradition. Further behind, he supposed, given that he had started with a few days late. The calendar still stretched across the wall, its painted numbers still glittering in the sun, its pouches limp and flat with the treasures plucked from them in a rush over the past few days. The little hoard had been moved from the pouches to the dining room table, though he hadn’t been home long enough to really examine anything. 

The Lucian capital had sparked to life the colder the winds blew in and the brighter the festive lights became. As the winter crawled on— winds blowing in northern icy fogs rather than the Leiden dusts across the Ostium Gorge until almost all of the city had at least one morning where boots slipped with the first step outside of a warm doorway— the pressures started to mount. The city glistened beneath a layer of ice, the streets a sleek shine when the sun rose most mornings. The attention started to turn from the small festivals here and there throughout parks and small communities across the city and all eyes focused again on the Citadel with is’ banners frozen in the cold winds and icicles hanging from the statues guarding the heavy doorways.

Eyes turned to the royal family, small as it was, attending meeting after meeting to accommodate the rest of Eos’ own winter holidays. The kingdom had only recently started to let the haunting charms of winter bleed into their own calendar.

The festive spirit— the gifting days of Tenebrae, the end of a calendar year of Accordo, the sombre remembrance days of Niflheim— had caught on through Lucis as the borders softened and friendly tourism thrived. Adaptations of the more popular festivals had been adopted through the years, and the Citadel remained at the heart of it all, though a few steps behind the pockets of communities that had taken over the community centres and festival grounds. 

The charming Crown Prince at the centre of this particular focus was asked his opinion on every slightest change to the Lucian events proposed through popular media and Council push— stopped on the steps and in the plaza as Ignis briefed him. He had been asked about his opinion on the proposals that had slipped through the Citadel walls, and the gifts he carried with him some days when it was colder— the knitted gloves dyed the Ulric colours that had been folded into a pouch, the little bag of treats he had been caught snacking on between meetings. 

He had left the rest of his little treasure horde scattered across his table through the month, revisiting them as he had a moment. 

There were notes and letters set in a neat pile— little recipes and tidbits of Ulric history; Selena’s doodles scattered between pages of maps and tiny art projects he had seen mirrored in Nyx’s hands and in his smile. There were kind words that never alluded to his royalty or crown, just a warm welcome. Noctis had read through them as they were unfolded, the pieces of maps put together with Nyx’s guidance until a full picture of the Ulric home was painted across his table— accented by Selena’s little doodles and notes to point out landmarks. 

There were flowers folded from the pages of recipes and colourful tissue twisted around painted wires. Another small jar of wishing stars more clumsily folded than the others, made into an ornament and set aside with the other little ornaments pulled from earlier pouches. There were treats and chocolates, cookies and small confections wrapped in colourful tissue paper and gauzy pouches piled into a shallow bowl. He had spread as much as he could across the table for reference and later examination— lures carved from bleached bone and wood, tusks and antlers set aside in a line. 

The gifts from Galahd had taken over the table, leaving others Noctis had meant to focus on pushed to the side. A half-composed letter to Luna set among them, gifts of stickers collected through the month kept safe for the little notebook he had been meaning to summon Umbra; a small trinket for his father found in a shop in passing. Then there were the forms and reports he was meant to catch up on stacked away on a counter where Ignis had left them. 

Noctis knew that he had fallen behind on all of his plans for the month. 

It had gotten overwhelming trying to keep up. 

“Last one, little star.”

Nyx smiled across the table from him, the coffee that had been stocked in Noctis’ cupboards for him warming his hands on the rare day they had away from the attentive eye of the Citadel. 

“Still haven’t really gone through them all. I should get something for your mother.”

“You can worry about that later. When we visit Ma, because she’s definitely not going to accept not meeting you now.”

He smiled at that— the little notes and letters had painted a vivid picture of the woman already. Noctis reached for the final pouch, the soft Lucian black velvet with its stencilled silver numbers shining like a star. There were two tags tied to the twine with ribbon— two holidays come together. It was only due to the holiday that Noctis wasn’t out facing the attention of his own people. 

There was a single strip of paper in the pouch, and Mrs. Ulric’s precise handwriting scrawled across it:

_Nyx had better be right. Welcome to the family._

Noctis frowned and turned to ask Nyx for the meaning. But there were beads on the table; two bone white beats and a single Ulric indigo. 

“What’s this?”

“Something like a proposal.”


End file.
